Raging, Ranting, Raving, and Rhapsodizing

I've mentioned that I'm working on my business, but I don't think I've written about what I'm doing. My hope is to develop a business doing commissioned portraits. You give me a photograph, and I draw it, essentially. It's something I've always been good at and something I've always been passionate about. It's pretty wild to think that in high school I spent an unsettling majority of my time drawing, and now people would pay me money (real money!) for my work.

My first step is to build my portfolio, partly to have something to show off to potential customers, and partly to figure out how long it takes me to complete a piece. As I'm working on my portfolio, I'm realizing I need to challenge myself to do much more detailed work than I have before. My audience is no longer myself and whoever I might show my sketchbook to. Now I'm drawing for people who know the subject intimately- a mother, a husband, whatever. In other words, I'm going to be doing work that will be subject to a much more critical and discerning eye. Right now, my drawing is probably good enough to impress most people. But is it good enough that a mother will look at it and see her child? Or will she see a face that looks nice but just isn't quite right?

Honestly, I have doubts from time to time if I'm good enough to produce art for that audience. And it's scary to put so much of yourself on a piece of paper and then "put it out there" to be criticized and possibly rejected. This is so new for me and I just don't know what to expect. But the more time I spend on a piece, the better it gets. The more hours I spend working every week, the better my work gets. I'm looking at this as an opportunity to develop my skills and bring them to a new level of maturity.